


Invisible Citiez

by norah



Category: Le città invisibili | Invisible Cities - Italo Calvino
Genre: Crack, Gen, Texting, WTF
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-25
Updated: 2012-12-25
Packaged: 2017-11-22 08:48:00
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 559
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/607987
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/norah/pseuds/norah
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Marco Polo is kind of a dick.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Invisible Citiez

**Author's Note:**

  * For [musicforwolves](https://archiveofourown.org/users/musicforwolves/gifts).



Text (literally; the images are of iPhone text conversations)

Kublai: So what is there to do around here?  
Marco: Once a year there is a market day in Amira. Banners unfurl around the grand port building, five stories tall and full of booths and stalls waiting to be filled to overflowing.  
Kublai: Awesome!  
Marco: Ships with tall masts line the harbour three deep, rowing in bundles of goods. Caravans crowd the access roads from the south and east.

Marco: And the inhabitants of the city, starved and hollow, haunt the edges of the scene, gnawing the husks of last year's dried bread and waiting for the gates to open.  
Kublai: Less awesome.  
Kublai: So when does this market day happen?  
Marco: Last month sometime.  
Kublai: Worst. Tour guide. Ever.

Kublai: Staaarving omg  
Marco: Lunch?  
Kublai: Totally where should I meet you  
Marco: At the intersection of two avenues, to the east of the town, buildings rise above one another like boxes, stacked precariously into the sky. Their gleaming towers hold within them everything anyone could desire.

Kublai: All I want is a burger dude  
Marco: You will find much else beside. This city holds within it much that men seek, but more that they would prefer remain hidden.  
Kublai: Whatever so where should I meet you  
Marco: [Surreal map that has a Google location mark next to a building labeled Love/Hate/Nonsense]  
Kublai: I don't even know why I still talk to you.

Marco: [Photo of houses suspended in air]  
Kublai: Sweet photo! Wheres that  
Marco: Octavia, the spider-web city.  
Kublai: Thats a big fuckin spider dude

Kublai: Yo Polo where you at  
Marco: Oh, just a little place called Atlantis.  
Kublai: Nfw  
Marco: The city of drowned dreams is as alive and vibrant as anything above the water. Its flooded plazas and sunken palaces are covered in bright corals and shining white sands, amongst which shining fishes dart and flicker. 

Marco: Lovely women with sea stars in their hair swim hand-in-hand with their darkly handsome lovers; its waterways bustle with dolphin riders and crab sellers hawking their wares. No city seems to me to be less lost than this, which is so very complete in itself.  
Kublai: How r u txting underwater  
Marco: Seriously, I'm in Atlantis and that's what you want to know?

Kublai: Is there anyhwere you haven't gone dude  
Marco: No  
Kublai: that was retiticak  
Marco: ?  
Kublai: er retiticak  
Kublai: r h e t o r i c a l fu autocorrect

Kublai: what abt the North pole  
Marco: Yes, no cities there though.  
Kublai: what abt el dorado  
Marco: Guatavita is what the natives call it. In that floating city whose golden spires rise from rush rafts, canoes navigate ever-changing streets from building to shining building, carrying diplomats and craftsmen, athletes and undertakers about their daily business. 

Marco: Fragrant smoke rises from censers at all hours of the day to drive off the biting flies, mingling with the rich scent of roasting fish. No city smells quite like Guatavita; after visiting, the traveller forever remembers it as the scent of gold.  
Kublai: You are totally makin this up aren't you  
Marco: No.

Kublai: How come you never bring me anything  
Marco: [Image of t-shirt reading "Marco Polo went to El Dorado and all I got was this lousy t-shirt"]  
Kublai: fuck youuuuuuuu omg

**Author's Note:**

> If you enjoyed this and want more Marco Polo's Tumblr can be found [here](http://ilpolo.tumblr.com).


End file.
